The Butterfly Waltz
by Foxfairy11
Summary: You have done nothing but work since your wife passed away a year ago." he had said. "I know people grieve differently, but drowning yourself in your work is neither healthy for you or your daughter. She misses you."
1. Wind

Sesshoumaru, forced on a vacation of some undetermined length by his father, is sent to a ranch in the middle of nowhere with his daughter. Figuring it to be a boring ordeal, he is suprised when he arives to the home of his father's, deceased, best friend. And in that house are rooms that no one can find, a piano that plays all night long, and a _painfully_ shy woman who had been hurt too many times.

Wind (solo piano)

_Someone was knocking incessantly on the front door, and since it was almost midnight, it was irritating him __greatly. Finally, he ferociously pulled open the door; his scathing remark dying when he saw the young woman standing there._

_Illuminated by the moon, she was a vision in her white shirt and cloak. Though, with her fur hood up, he could not see much of her face. So his eyes were drawn to the large, rather flat package she was holding upright with one hand._

_Without saying a word, she lifted it up and offered it to him._

_"What is it?" He asked, breaking the silence but not taking it. Saying nothing she just pushed the package closer to him._

_"Who is it from and to who?" he tried again._

_"To Toga Tashio, and from..." She paused, licking her lips, "Higurashi."_

_Taking the package he noticed she also wore loose pants, soft looking boots, and leather gloves; all in white. A gentle breeze grabbed a lock of ebony hair and playfully swirled it around._

_He turned to set the package down and when he turned back, noticed that the girl had silently started walking away._

_"Who are you?" He called after her._

_Pausing at the top of the steps off the porch, She looked over her shoulder at him for a moment, then bowed her head._

_"Goodnight Sesshoumaru," She said, mounting the white horse that had suddenly materialized from thin air, "Sweet dreams." And then, she was gone._

_Closing the door, Sesshoumaru looked at the package; and realized, he had never given her his name._

'.' '.' '.' '.' '.' '.'

Sesshoumaru still couldn't believe his father was forcing him to leave to go to some secluded place in the middle of nowhere, with no towns for miles around. _You have done nothing but work since your wife passed away a year ago._ he had said. _I know people grieve differently, but drowning yourself in your work is neither healthy for you or your daughter. She misses you. _

At that memory he became rather guilty for not paying as much attention to her as he probably should.

_There are many horses, so Rin should not become bored._ But if he was to spend time with her he would have to, at the very least, learn to tolerate the smelly beasts.

_You shall not be bored either_ his father had gone on. _For there are many secrets in this place to be found. There are a couple rooms you cant get into, and apparently a few rooms in the house you'll be staying in have gone missing. _Now _that_ had caught his interest. How could rooms go missing? It's not like they just suddenly grew legs and walked away.

Glancing at his father out of the corner of his eye, Sesshoumaru saw a look of pain and sadness he had seen only once before. And that was because of something in that package he had gotten all those years ago from that Higrishi, or Higashi or whoever it was.

'.' '.' '.' '.' '.' '.'

_"What's that, Sesshoumaru?"_

_Sesshoumaru looked over towards the door to where his father was pointing._

_"It''s for you. It came late last night." He scowled at the thought of __just how late._

_"Who's it from?"_

_"Some Higurashi person."Sesshoumaru answered before taking a sip of his coffee._

_In about two seconds flat his father had the package opened to find something large and flat wrapped in heavy brown paper with a small white envelope atatched with tape on it._

_Toga was written on the outside of the envelope in a beautiful flowing script._

_For some unexplainable reason, Toga's face paled. Sesshoumaru watched as his father slowly opened the envelope and pulled out the paper inside with shaking hands._

_Sesshoumaru watched, slightly concerned as his father's face grew even paler as he read the letter._

_"Oh God." Toga moaned as he let the paper slip from his hands._

_Sesshoumaru picked up the paper and read:_

**_Dear Toga,_**

**_Please accept my sincerest apologizes for sending you this letter. I know that you will grieve very much from what I must tell you._**

**_I am Kagome Higurashi. Sota Higurashi's youngest daughter. It is my unfortunate job to inform you that, a few days ago, he died. _**

**_The funeral will take place in three days from now. If you would like, you may stay the night in one of my many guest rooms._**

**_If you wish, you may also bring your sons._**

**_I would like for you to have what is wrapped in the brown paper. It was something my father had been working on when he died, and he _**

**_had told me about it. He said that you had been expressing interest in the pictures of the rearing horse with the girl, so I think he would _**

**_have wanted you to have this to remember him by. _**

**_Kagome._**

'.' '.' '.' '.' '.' '.'

Sesshoumaru started awake. Disorientedly he realized that: the car had come to a stop, he didn't know where he was, and that the setting sun was blinding him. He looked over to the driver's seat when he heard his father chuckle.

"We're here." Toga said as he opened the door and got out.

Sitting there for a minute trying to figure out where exactly he was and wake up a little more fully, he heard his father open the back door of the car to wake his daughter, Rin, up and tell her they were there.

"Where are the horsies?" was the first thing out of her mouth.

"I'm sure you'll see them tomorrow dear," Toga replied.

As Sesshoumaru got out of the car rubbing his stiff neck, two large brown horses walked around the side of a small building. Each horse had a male rider.

Slipping down the side of one, a man Sesshoumaru would have guessed was roughly about his own age, told the much younger looking one to take care of the horses.

"Hello," The man greeted, smiling. "My name is Miroku. You are Toga," he said, looking at his father. "So you must be Sesshoumaru." Sesshoumaru shook his hand.

"Well I guess you guys want to see the house you'll be staying in. It's right this way." Miroku led them around the little garage, as Sesshoumaru now realized what it was, and to the front porch of a giant white house.

The porch was covered and wrapped around the side of the house. A bench swing innocently drifted back and forth, as if having been abandoned quickly and recently. Miroku ushered them inside the bright red door. "There is only one person living here right now, her name is Kagome. You probably wont see her very much, she tends to keep to herself alot. I think the only rooms that are always kept locked are her room and the photography room. So you can feel free to move into any room that you want." Toa and Sesshoumaru listened intently to what Miroku was saying.

Miroku was leading them into the living room when a large crash came from the hallway leading into the rest of the house made all of the men jump. After a short pause, in which Sesshoumaru realized his daughter was no longer with him, a young woman ran out of the hallway looking like she had just seen a ghost.

"Where's Rin?" Toga asked quietly.

"I can almost guarantee she's down the hallway." Miroku said as he started down it.

And standing there, looking stunned, was Rin.

Looking up at Miroku innocently she asked, "Did I do something wrong?"

"No, dear," he answered, "You just remind her of someone."

"Who do I remind her of?"

"Uhh... Well.." but he was saved from answering by yelling from the front of the house.

"Yo, Miroku! What's up with Kagome? She almost ran me over coming out the door and went flying up the trail to the cemetary." The younger boy from earlier came around the corner and stopped dead in his tracks. "Oh shit." he whispered, staring wide eyed at Rin.

"Dont stare Kohaku." Miroku reprimanded.

"Oh! Well umm.. Now I know why Kagome ran out of here so fast." Kohaku said as he ripped his gaze from the 10 year old girl.

"Lets get you two some rooms to stay in, I know you've had a long drive." Miroku said, ignoring the looks Toga and Sesshoumaru were giving them.

"I think I know the room she will want to have." Kohaku told Miroku.

"Then lead the way."

------

"Well this is the master bedroom, but umm.. I'm not sure you'll want it."

Sesshoumaru turned from looking at the giant room to raise an eyebrow at Miroku, who looked uneasy.

"Umm.. Well.. you see.. the music room is right under here and uhh.. for some reason uhh.. the sound carries extraordinarily well.."

"The sound of what?" Then suddenly the room was filled with beautiful piano music.


	2. Dream a Little Dream of Me

Thank you SOO MUCH for reviewing angelapage!! You have NO idea how much it meant to me. It made me smile :D

Dream a Little Dream of Me

He was in a bad mood.

Upon waking he had realized that the day before hadn't just been some horrible nightmare, and he really _was_ going to have to stay out in the middle of nowhere until his father called him back.

And then, to make matters worse, when he finally got up to get dressed, none of his clothes were where he had put them. Instead, in their place, were jeans and tshirts that weren't his.

---------

Stading in an isle in the stable Miroku had led them to, Sesshoumaru tried not to touch anything as he watched Rin try to help Miroku brush a horse.

Everything was dirty and it smelled really bad. And none of it was helping his mood _at all._

"Ya know, if you would like something to do, there is something you could help us with that doesn't require much knowledge of horses.."

Sesshoumaru turned to Kohaku trying not to let him know he had been startled.

"There's this horse who needs to get use to people before we can do anything with her and none of us have the time to do it." Kohaku motioned for Sesshoumaru to follow him. "Her name is River Dancer she's about 6 or 7, and she is very shy of people. Well, except for Kagome. But Kagome wont even look at her." He explained as they walked out to a large pasture that held .

Sesshoumaru gave the teenaged boy a confused look, but Kohaku ignored it and went on. "All you need to do is get her use to your presence. Get her to come up to you. Maybe eventually get her to eat something out of your hand."

Sesshoumaru just nodded his understanding before going back to check on his daughter.

----------

"Daddy I'm riding a horsie!!"

"So I see." He said indulgently, happy that she was happy.

"And Miroku said that when his mommy gets back in a day or two, she'll give me lessons and teach me how to trot!" Sesshoumaru smiled at how enthusiastic she was.

"And Miroku _also _said that when I get real good at trot his mommy will teach me how to canter! And when I get real good at canter, she'll teach me to _jump_."

"That sounds _very_ exciting Rin."

Movement caught his eye and Sesshoumaru looked across the arena his daughter was walking a horse around in to see a woman standing there watching Rin with an unreadable expression on her face.

"Oh Kagome!" Miroku exclaimed when he finally realized she was standing there. "This is Sesshoumaru, and this is his daughter Rin. Sesshoumaru, Rin, This is Kagome. She lives in the house you are staying in."

Kagome looked Sesshoumaru in the eyes and he was stunned by just how very _extraordinary_ her eyes were. They weren't really any special color, just a light honeyish brown, but there was _something_ about them that made them seem to stand out. Her small nod was almost missed before she turned to Rin.

"Hello Rin. I am sorry about our.. _meeting_ last night. I am.. _unused,_ to having children in my house who look so much like me. It gave me quite a start."

Her voice was soft, but Sesshoumaru could still hear it clearly. He almost missed what she was really saying with how strongly he was focusing on her voice. Not only was it an amazing voice, but it also sounded _familiar._

'.' '.' '.' '.' '.' '.'

_Sesshoumaru looked over his father's shoulder at the large, framed picture he was holding as if it were a new born baby._

_There was a large, black horse rearing up over a young woman, who was wearing a flowy white dress with a large bright red, satiny sash. There was obviously some wind when the picture had been taken, because the girl's long black hair and dress were floating around her. She had a lazy smile on her face and her right hand was raised as if in the middle of a princess wave._

_He watched, with the letter still in his hand, as his father mounted the picture on the wall facing the door._

_"So everyone can see her, but not speak to her. Just how she likes it." Sesshoumaru heard his father say to himself when he was finally satisfied with how the picture hung._

_Sesshoumaru looked at him confused, but decided not to say anything and went to make them both some more coffee._

'.' '.' '.' '.' '.' '.'

"Hey Daddy?" Rin said, getting his attention as he brushed her long hair, still wet from her bath.

"Yes Rin?"

"Doesn't that look like Grandpa's picture?" she was pointing to a large framed picture that hung over the mantel of the fireplace in the living room.

Looking at it, it did look remarkably like the one of a large, rearing black horse and a young woman wearing a white dress with a bright red sash that hung in front of his father's house that greeted everyone. Except there was something different about the one he was looking at then.

"Except in the one at Granpa's house, she's smiling." Rin pointed out.

"Hn." Sesshoumaru agreed, in the one he was looking at the girl had a more serious look on her face. She was looking away from the camera and had a look of _longing_ in her eyes. Like she _wanted_ to be somewhere else, somewhere she couldn't be.

-----------

"Bed time Rin."

"Will you read to me?" She asked hopefully.

"Of course." Sesshoumaru hear the front door close, and saw Kagome quickly but quietly walking down the hallway. "What would you like me to read you tonight Rin?"

"Hmmm..." He picked her up and began towards the room she had picked last night, when Kohaku and Miroku had given them a tour of the very large house, as she thought.

"I want you to read me... Sleeping Beauty!"

"Sleeping Beauty it is." he said as he opened his daughter's room's door. The room was decorated in horses. One of the walls was a murel of a pasture with horses of different colors in it.

The comforter had running horses on it. The walls were littered with different pictures of horses, all the handles on the dresser were shaped like a horseshoe, and there were what seemed like a thousand stuffed animal horses. One of which was rigid enough for someone as small as Rin to sit on it.

Sesshoumaru tucked Rin in and settled down to read her Sleeping Beauty.

-----------

At the end, Rin was barely awake enough to smile and say "_And they lived happily ever after. The End._"

After kissing his daughter's forehead Sesshoumaru slipped out of her room and into his.

After he had changed into his pyjamas, which had thankfully been left alone, he was just settling into his bed when one note rang throughout the room, then a slight hesitation, and finally his room was filled with music.


	3. On The Way

BY THE WAY: I went back to the first chapter and changed Kagome's father's name from Souta to Minoru. To those of you who reviewed, Thank you SO MUCH. Sorry for how long it took to get this up, I've acutally been kinda busy (which is unusual since I pretty much have no life.) so I could only write in small pieces at a time. Hopefully things will slow down soon and I'll be able to get the next chapter up soon. :) Thanks for reading.

On The Way

_Sesshoumaru walked through the front door of his father's house to find the entry way littered with boxes and bags._

_"What is going on here?" Sesshoumaru asked out loud to himself as he slowly made his way through the mess._

_Hearing his father laughing loudly to his right, Sesshoumaru headed in the direction of the kitchen._

_His father was talking with someone whose back was to him. Medium length bright red hair was loose down the person's back._

_"Sesshoumaru! My boy! I want you to meet someone." Toga stood up and went around the island he was sitting at to stand by the other person, who hadn't even acknowleged him yet. "Yuri this is Sesshoumaru my eldest son, who I've been telling you about." Yuri turned around and brought her eyes up the length of his body as his father introduced her to him. Her hazel eyes locked with his golden ones as his father began to explain that she had just graduated high school and was going to be attending the college nearby, and was going to be staying there until further notice._

_"Would it be okay if she has your old room, Sesshoumaru? After mine, it is the largest and has a bathroom connected to it. And with her being female, those kinds of things tend to matter." Toga smiled jokingly at the girl, "Do they not?"_

_The girl's hazel eyes slid from Sesshoumaru to his father as she smiled. "Oh yes, Sir, they do matter." Her voice was soft and sweet and, to Sesshoumaru, somewhat sensual._

_"Now now, Yuri, how many times do I have to tell you to call me Toga?" His father chided playfully._

_"Probably many, many more, Sir- I mean, Toga." Yuri said with a little laugh, which somehow warmed Sesshoumaru up from the inside out._

'.' '.' '.' '.' '.' '.'

Sesshoumaru awoke to the feeling of being suffocated.

Opening his eyes and lifting his head he saw a grey cat standing on him, looking at him in interest with big yellow eyes.

Sesshoumaru grimaced. He _hated _cats.

"Get _off_ of me."

Instead of listening to him, the cat laid down and started purring.

Scowling at it, he went to push it off his chest when his door burst open and Rin bounced in.

It took her about a mili-second to realize a cat was laying on her father.

Rin gasped in excitement, her eyes wide. "When did you get a kitty Daddy?"

The cat turned and looked at the girl before starting to purr even louder and flex it's claws as if trying to fluff Sesshoumaru's chest.

"Come here kitty!" Rin called. Surprisingly the cat stood up. And then, still purring, the cat pushed off of Sesshoumaru and jumped to the floor.

Rin giggled as the cat then started to rub it's head on her knee.

"Rin, why don't you go get dressed so we can eat and figure out what we're going to do today, alright?"

The girl looked up at him smiling. "Okay!" Turning to the door she looked at the cat, who had stopped purring, and beckoned to it. "Come on kitty, lets go get dressed."

The cat obediently began to follow her out of Sesshoumaru's room.

Sesshoumaru then let his head drop back down onto his pillow with a small sigh.

He just knew that somehow that cat was going to make him _miserable._

------------

"What shall we do today Rin?" Sesshoumaru asked as he finished putting their breakfast dishes in the dishwasher.

"Lets... Hmmm.." his daughter put her index finger on her chin and made a cute thinking face. "Lets explore the house! It's so _big_! And then when we're done, lets go see the horsies!"

Sesshoumaru heaved a mental sigh. He _so _didn't want to see the smelly beasts.

"Alright Rin, Let's explore."

Rin grabbed his hand and started skipping off down the nearest hallway.

"Come on Daddy, skip with me!"

-----------

Rin and Sesshoumaru stood in the doorway of the library, surprised at how large it was.

"Wow. Daddy, even Grandpa doesn't even have this many books!" Rin looked around the room with wide eyes.

Floor to ceiling book shelves were placed along every wall and shorter, but still tall, book shelves were in every other avalible space possible. Walking into the room, they went down one isle, only to find that after two right turns it turned into a dead end, and they had to retrace their steps.

Soon, Sesshoumaru and Rin were completely and horribly lost.

Taking a left turn, they abruptly stopped. There was a square of space that didn't have any book shelves, instead, there was a white grand piano.

Sesshoumaru ran his hand over the top of it and came away with a thick layer of dust. A black picture frame laying face down on the keys caught Sesshoumaru's eye. Picking it up and turning it over he saw there wasn't a picture in it. Instead there were note cards with writing, in it.

_Take one. _

Sesshoumaru took one.

_Sit on the bench and look right._

He did as the paper said and discovered a path.

_Take that path._

"Come on Rin. Let's get out of this crazy maze."

_Go left at the fork._

'What fork?' he wondered as the path took a sharp left and brought them to a fork in the path. 'Oh. _That_ fork.'

_Second Right_

_Third Right_

_Left right away_

_Second Left_

_Fourth Right_

_Take the middle path._

Sesshoumaru was relieved when he finally saw a door. He knew that they probably hadn't even seen half of the library yet, but that was best left to another day.

A day when they could pack a lunch first.

-----------

The next two rooms they looked in were small guest rooms. Opening the third door they were met with an generously sized empty room with mirrors all along the longest wall and a hard wood floor. Different height bars ran across the wall opposite the mirrors. And when he walked into the room he saw he had missed the back grand paino that was in the corner closest to the door. 'Another one?' he thought. 'Why would someone need more than one piano?'

"Look Daddy, I'm a ballerina!" Rin was on her tiptoes spinning in a circle with her arms in an arch over her head.

Sesshoumaru chuckled when Rin made a small squeak and her eyes opened impossibly wide, as she tripped over her own foot and landed on her backside.

Piano forgotten, Sesshoumaru went and lifted Rin up, then threw her in the air where squealed in surprise. Catching her, he calmly put her over his shoulder like a bag of potatos and started walking out of the room.

"Hey!" was her indignant yell as she tried, unsucssefully, to get down from her father's shoulder.

-----------

After making sure Rin was situated properly on his back, Sesshoumaru opened another door, in a different hallway then the library. The room was rather long, and only about 8 feet wide.

"Is this room empty too?" Rin asked innocently.

"I'm not sure," He answered as he found the light switch and flipped it on.

The hard wood floor of the room was completely empty, but the walls were filled with large and regular sized picture frames. The first picture they saw was of a little girl who looked exactly like Rin, wearing a little green dress, sitting on the back of a black horse with no saddle or bridle. The little girl had a big bright smile on her face.

"Daddy, who's that?" Rin whispered in Sesshoumaru's ear.

A little bronze plaque said:

_Kagome Higurashi & Tonbo_

_Age 9 & 2_

_1990_

"That would be Kagome when she was 9 years old, Rin." Sesshoumaru answered.

Walking down the room looking at both sides there were more pictures of Miroku when he was a teenager, a girl with brown black hair named Kikyou, and a little boy named Souta. They were about halfway down the room when Rin stopped her father with an amazed "_Wow_"

Sesshoumaru turned and saw the picture immediately. It was of a young girl riding a large, pure white horse bareback, over a jump with her arms stretched out to her sides, with no bridle or reins or seemingly _anything_ to control the horse. Her black hair was in a braid down her back and she had more joy expressed on her face than he had ever seen on anyone else's in his entire life.

The plaque beneath the picture read:

_Kagome Higurashi & Akihiko_

_Age 14 & 4_

_1995_

Continuing down that wall, they saw no more Kikyou or Souta pictures, less and less Miroku pictures, and many more pictures of Kagome on different horses. And none of the horses she was riding ever had a saddle or bridle on. The last picture on that wall was really large. The large black horse stood on a stage proudly, while Kagome, who was in a stiff, white ballet tutu*, was in pointe on one foot while the other was parallel to the ground, on the back of the horse.

The plaque said that Kagome had been 16 at the time and Tonbo, 9.

The first picture on the next wall was of a young Kagome and another girl, with brown hair and hazel eyes, who didn't look much older than Kagome. Kagome was on what Sesshoumaru recognized as Tonbo and the other girl was on a large chestnut horse. Neither had a saddle or bridle on. Looking down to the bottom of the picture Sesshoumaru was surprised to see that there wasn't a little plaque there. The next few were of the same two girls on the same horses, and there was still no plaque.

As they went down the wall, the pictures showed the girls as they aged.

One of the last ones of the girls stopped him in his tracks.

Kagome was holding a little baby, with black hair, and there was a look of love and adoration on her face as she looked at the sleeping child. Standing there next to her was her brown haired friend. And except for having brown hair instead of red, the brown haired girl looked exactly like his wife the first time he met her.

_Kagome, Amaya &Yuri_

_Age 17, 4 months & 18_

_1998_

------------

Sesshoumaru stood by the big picture window in his room, but wasn't really seeing the beautiful sunset. Instead all he could focus on was that picture he had seen that morning. He was sure the Yuri in that picture was the same woman who became his wife. But his wife had always had _red_ hair, not brown.

His head was starting to ache.

Walking over to the large bed, Sesshoumaru sat down then started to lay down. Not anticipating something being on the bed, he was extremely surprised when he felt something soft and heard a yowl from underneath his back. Jumping up, Sesshoumaru found that it was the cat that had stood on his chest that morning.

"_Go Away_." he practically growled.

The cat gave him a disgusted look before lazily getting up and strutting to the opposite side of the bed where it started to wash itself.

A few moments after he laid back down, the piano started to play. And about an hour into the playing, he started to drifted to sleep with the cat curled up next to him purring loudly.

'

'

'

*If you want to know what I see Kagome's ballet outfit and posistion to be look up "Australian Ballet stages classic Nutcracker" and the picture will most likely be the first one... but just to make sure, it should be on abc. net. au (but without the spaces)


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